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Quieter, please!

It was a TV commercial with an ironic twist. “Can you hear me now?” the character known only as Test Man kept asking in ads to promote cell phones.

For over half a century, Americans have been questioning what they hear during TV ads. Loud commercials remain a pet peeve of millions.

Sales pitches with pumped-up volume - making them much louder than the shows they interrupt - are ubiquitous. They’re a relentless daily bother.

But relief seems to be on the way. Finally.

Congress is on the verge of passing the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act. CALM, for short. The House and Senate have unanimously approved versions of the bill, with minor differences to be worked out after lawmakers return from their Election Day recess.

“It’s about time we turned down the volume on loud commercials that try to startle TV watchers into paying attention,” said Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), one of the co-sponsors of the legislation. “TV viewers should be able to watch their favorite programs without fear of losing their hearing when the show goes to a commercial.”

Why did the feds look the other way for so long?

Twenty-six years ago, the Federal Communications Commission decided there was no fair way to regulate what it called the “apparent loudness” of ads on television.

Nevertheless, the problem was real and it didn’t go away. Since 2002, loud TV commercials have been listed among the leading gripes in 21 of the 25 quarterly reports by the FCC on consumer complaints.

A big problem over the years has been that TV programs and commercials come from a wide variety of sources, from national syndicators to local businesses.

Before the digital age, correcting sound levels without spoiling the telecasts was seen as daunting.

Now the Advanced Television Systems Committee, an international non-profit group that develops standards for digital TV, has developed the technical guidelines necessary to control variations in volume. It has issued rules on how to measure, process and transmit uniform audio.

Under the new legislation, the FCC would have to adopt those standards as regulations within a year, and thereafter begin enforcing them within another year. This gives broadcasters time to do the necessary fine tuning.

The CALM Act would enable the FCC to monitor the volume levels of TV shows and their commercials. The ads during a program are not to be any louder than the loudest moment of the show, nor are those peak volumes to be sustained throughout the commercials.

Critics in big business call this an unwarranted intrusion by big government into the field of marketing. They say there are digital products that TV viewers can buy if they want to even out the volume. Backers of the CALM Act want broadcasters to intervene on behalf of the public.

For most of us, it comes as a welcome break.

About 115 million U.S. homes have televisions. Since 2005, there has been an average of more TVs per household than people. Over half of the homes in America have three or more television sets.

No wonder TV commercials - at a rate of 12 minutes or so every hour - are pervasive. Especially, in the lives of children, the viewers who see the most television. They’re exposed to about 5,000 commercials a year.

For young and old alike, leveling the volume during the ads on TV is certainly sound.